The Longest Day Part I. So, we got to Tapachula near the Guatemalan border early in the morning to find another bus to Guatemala City waiting to take me away, ha ha. So goodbye Mexico, I’ll see you again next week. The journey into Guate City was fairly uneventful, as was the quick change for San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador. I got in about 7pm.

After an amazingly scary oh-dear-it’s-dark-I-got-no-map-where-the-hell-is-an-ATM-when-you-need-one walk around the city, I found a bus that was leaving at 3am going all the way through Honduras, Nicaragua and ending up in San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica. It would get me in at 10pm the same day. All good. I threw my bag in the bus station office and headed out to the pub.

It was in the Irish bar (there’s always an Irish bar) that I met Jorge and Rene, a couple of locals who took me under their wing. Beer was downed, jokes told and stories exchanged and before I knew it, I was being whisked off to a Sushi Restaurant (what’s with all the Sushi on this adventure? It’s becoming a recurring theme). There I met Memo, one of Jorge’s mates…and we decided that since it was getting late (almost midnight), it would be best to head to the beach.

We got there in Memo’s car, screaming and raucous – and it was perfect. Everything the beaches in the Caribbean should be (but aren’t) – free to everyone, wooden huts and hammocks (not concrete and walls) music, people dancing, a bar still serving…

At midnight, I placed my hands in the Pacific Ocean. I’m now thirty. Hear that Pacific? I’M THIRTY!!!! The Pacific was overwhelmingly indifferent. I returned to my beer, whom I know loves me. Memo, Jorge and I drank in the cool night air. We could have been in Thailand. I really couldn’t think of a better way to see in the big three-o.

I had a bus to catch, and – damn! – it was leaving very soon. Memo drove like a maniac. But he drove like a maniac to the wrong bus station. San Salvador has no central bus station, every bus company has it’s own garage. Some, annoyingly, have two.

As the seconds ticked away, we drove around and around the city like Jack Bauer with the squits. Hang on – I recognise that poster! The bus station is over… but then…

The police pulled us over.

Memo was outraged. He had to get this Ginger Gringo to his bus. Why are the police pulling him over? I thought he might have been speeding. Not so. After searching us and the car for drugs or bombs or whatever, they continued talking to Memo, who was getting increasingly infuriated with their intransigence – my bus left in less than five minutes and I was yet to buy a ticket.

If I hadn’t been drunk, I probably wouldn’t have done it, but hell, it’s Central America and I’m thirty. Let’s do something I’ve never done before in my life.

Let’s bribe a policeman.

So I did. Will this make you go away? I ask, hoping he doesn’t speak a word of English as I passed over a 20-dollar bill.

An awkward moment. Was I to spend the rest of my birthday in a prison cell in El Salvador for attempting to bribe a policeman? No. Don’t worry – it’s El Salvador. The policeman stuffed the twenty in his pocket and before he could say adios, Memo was tearing down the highway towards the bus station…

Only to get there five minutes late. The bus had gone. But all was not lost. Memo spoke to the people in the bus station and they said there was another company’s bus that does the same route down to Costa Rica, and it leaves at 4am.

Crackerjack!

Only – my bag was in the station office, and the only guy with a key had gone to bed in the hotel upstairs. Tonight was turning into a 1980s text adventure. North, north, up. A troll blocks your way. Pay troll $20. Troll shuffles off. Knock on door. Awaken keymaster. Keymaster unhappy. Get key. Down, south, south. You can see the office door. Use key with door. East. Get bag. Drop key. West.

So eventually Memo and I made it to the King Quality bus station at 4am, just in time for the bus. After thanking Memo profusely for such an excellent birthday adventure, I plonked myself down on the back seat of the bus next to a cute Argentinean girl called Sophia. Within 5 seconds, I was fast asleep.

I got into Guatemala City about 10am (not much sleep on the bus then) and hopped straight onto a bus for Puerto Barrios on the Caribbean coast. This was the plan for getting to Belize, but it was a little stuffed up by the fact that I was running four hours late. Now Belize isn’t Belizey-Peasy as it’s name suggests. More affiliated with the Caribbean (down fried chicken!) than Latin America, this once-British enclave of Central America is a little off the beaten path and a little tricky to get to. It involves a five-hour coach journey and a couple of boats.

There’s a boat that leaves Puerto Barrios for Punta Gorda in Belize at 2pm and then comes back at 4pm. I got to Puerto Barrios at 5pm. But luckily, I met Ishmael (as in Call me…). This wonderfully crazy guy from Livingstone in Guatemala was on the bus with me from the capital. Now Livingstone is a little town on the Caribbean coast that is only accessible by boat – it’s halfway to Belize.

Ishmael took me under his wing and we headed over Livingstone. He thought he might be able to help me get a private boat over to Punta Gorda and back before it got dark. But it was not to be, it was just too late in the day. He did however, sort me out with a boat the following morning and offer me somewhere to kip for the night.

Ishmael’s place was pretty basic – no electricity or running water, but it had a hammock and you know I’m a sucker for hammocks. So I dropped off my gear and we headed out to what passes for ‘town’ in Livingston (the main street) and had a few drinks, got something to eat and got to hang out with Ishmael’s mates.

Here’s a video of me freaking out that I’m now thirty years old. IT’S DEAD FUNNY:

The boat that Ishmael had got me on (it had been chartered by a German couple – I was cheekily tagging along for the ride) was doing a trip over to Belize early in the morning, and it meant I got a speedy trip over there, and an hour to kick my heels in Punta Gorda (it was election day) before heading back. Ishmael accompanied me on the boat back to the bus station and by one in the afternoon, I was on the bus back to Guatemala City. I don’t know if in the long run this was the quickest way of doing it, but it all worked out alright – even though I was a bit late getting to Guat City, I got an overnight bus to the Mexican border.

By this stage of my Herculean bus ride, it had been a week since I’d had a hot shower. To say I was beginning to smell a little ripe, would be an understatement! The bus got me to the Mexican border before Mexico had decided to open for the day, so I found myself waiting for a) Mexico to open, and b) the bus to the capital to show up. I had been told that the bus arrived at 10am. But you should know by now not to trust anything anyone says, ever. It came at 1pm.

I was so excited to be back in Mexico – Mexican FOOD!! Woo! Enchiladas, Nachos, Burritos, Fajitas OH YEAH…

I just wanted to stuff my big greedy face, but a nasty side effect of the malaria tablets I’ve been taking (incorrectly – they aren’t joking when they say plenty of water) is that when I eat or drink anything I get a sharp pain in my chest – like when you eat too many cold McCain’s Oven Chips too fast. So I did a great Homer-eating-Pinchy impression over dinner – dinner that we didn’t stop for until midnight.

It was an overnight bus, and it was pretty grotty. I didn’t get to make any new friends, so I just turned on my ipod, looked out of the window at the ever-changing landscape and zoned out.

THE TRAVELOMETER

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The Odyssey Expedition

"We all dream about travelling the world. But some dreams are bigger than others."

My name is Graham Hughes. I'm an adventurer, film-maker, travel blogger and TV presenter from Liverpool, England. On January 1 2009 I crossed the River Plate into Uruguay and began The Odyssey Expedition: The first official Guinness World Record attempt to visit every sovereign state on Planet Earth without flying.

Along the way I self-filmed and presented the TV show Graham's World for the National Geographic Adventure channel and raised funds for the registered charity WaterAid.

I travelled alone, without any back-up and on a shoestring budget of less than $100 a week. I kept costs down by CouchSurfing with locals and hitching rides on cargo ships whenever possible.

It was an adventure of epic proportions. I spent four days crossing open ocean in a leaky wooden boat to reach Cape Verde, I was imprisoned for a week in Congo and was arrested whilst attempting to sneak into Russia.

I ran the blockade into Cuba, blagged my way into Eritrea, ran around Iraq with an AK-47, spent seven days in Tibet and warned schoolchildren in Afghanistan about the dangers of men with beards.

I met the Prime Minister of Tuvalu, rode on top of a 18-wheeler through the northern badlands of Kenya, hitched a ride on a cruise ship to The Dominican Republic, joined a Bwiti tribe in Gabon, screamed at the ocean in El Salvador and watched a space shuttle blast off in the USA.

I set the Guinness World Record for 'The Most Countries Visited in One Year by Scheduled Ground Transport' and, on Monday November 26 2012, became the first person to visit all 201 soveriegn nations of the world without flying.

Having completed the First Surface Journey To Every Country in the world by crossing the border into South Sudan (which didn't even exist when I began the adventure), I raced back home to Liverpool, England. And, in the spirit of the adventure, I did it without flying. I arrived on the Ferry Cross The Mersey on Saturday 22 December 2012.

The rules of The Odyssey Expedition, as set by me and the nice chaps at Guinness World Records

- I cannot fly

- I may not drive

- I must use scheduled ground transport

- I must step foot on dry land

You might think that would have been the end of it all, but a rep from Guinness World Records got back to me saying that they were not going to validify my record attempt as I had crossed into Russia illegally.
So I returned to Russia, this time with a visa! Still, it wasn't until a year later that Guinness had gone through the 1,000,000 GPS points, 10,000 photos, 400 hours of video and 192 passport pages... and finally, catagorically and officially approved the record. I am, and always will be, the first person to visit every country in the world without flying.

The Odyssey Expedition, this four year journey of the soul, is now complete. You can read the adventure from the start by clicking here and you can watch my videos on YouTube. Look out for my TV show, 'GRAHAM'S WORLD' on the National Geographic Adventure channel - it covers the first twelve months of the journey. If you are in the UK, you can watch it for free on YouTube by clicking here

I'm currently living in Panama and working on the upcoming book of my adventures, tentatively titled '201: An Earth Odyssey'. I'll also be churning out more Odyssey Expedition videos, so keep looking out for new ones!!

Now that it's all over, I'd like to thank everybody who helped me along the way. Please note that the Just Giving page for WaterAid is still active (see below) and if you enjoy these blogs, please make a small donation. If you'd like to have a crack at breaking my world records, feel free to contact me and I'll give you all the support I can.

Wanna know why I'm doing in Panama? Well, I won an island. YES I WON AN ISLAND!!! To find out more about my latest madcap adventure head over to my brand new blog, Jinja Island.

WaterAid

One of the goals of The Odyssey Expedition was to help raise funds and awareness for the charity WaterAid, a UK-based registered charity fighting to alleviate the disease, misery and death caused by open sewers, contaminated drinking water and bad sanitation in developing countries around the world. If you enjoy these blogs, then please give give give.

It's shocking that even today, children are still dying from diarrhoea - one of the most preventable and cheaply treated diseases in the world. A donation of just one dollar would pay for a simple sugar-salt solution which could genuinely save a child's life.

The Odyssey Expedition's JustGiving account ensures that 100 percent of the money you donate goes directly to WaterAid.